AMD Radeon RX 480

The AMD Radeon RX 480, built on the 14 nm Ellesmere chip with GCN 4.0 architecture, occupies a peculiar position in the benchmark hierarchy: its average score of 34,059 places it in the 78th percentile of all GPUs, yet its nearest rivals span nearly a decade of product releases. This is a card defined by its balance—not exceptional in any single metric, but consistently adequate across resolutions and workloads. The data indicates a GPU that remains viable for 1080p gaming and light 1440p usage, though its architectural age shows in modern ray-traced titles. Below, the benchmark results are dissected to show exactly where the RX 480 stands and what that means for prospective users.

Who Should Consider It

The RX 480 is best suited for gamers targeting 1080p resolution with high detail settings in DirectX 12 titles, where its 5.834 TFLOPS of FP32 compute and 256.0 GB/s of memory bandwidth provide sufficient headroom. Its average benchmark score of 34,059, combined with a 78th percentile ranking, suggests it outperforms roughly three-quarters of all GPUs in the database—a respectable position for a card from the Arctic Islands generation. For 1440p gaming, the data shows the RX 480 is workable but not ideal; the 8 GB GDDR5 frame buffer helps, but the 256-bit bus and 40.51 GPixel/s pixel rate will struggle with maximum settings in newer titles. Users with 4K displays should look elsewhere, as the card's 182.3 GTexel/s texture rate and 32 ROPs are insufficient for that resolution in demanding games.

The 78th percentile ranking indicates this card is a middle-tier performer. It is not a high-end enthusiast part, nor is it an entry-level budget option. The RX 480 shines in esports titles and older AAA games at 1080p, where its 1:1 FP16 to FP32 ratio (5.834 TFLOPS each) offers no advantage but its raw FP32 power is more than adequate. For users upgrading from a card like the HD 7950—which scores a nearly identical 34,050—the RX 480 delivers a similar average performance but with modern feature support like Vulkan 1.3 and DirectX 12_0, making it a sensible sideways move for software compatibility rather than raw speed.

Ray Tracing and Feature Set

The RX 480 has no dedicated ray tracing cores—the FACT PACK lists rtCores as null—and no tensor cores for AI acceleration. Hardware ray tracing is entirely absent from this architecture. However, the card supports DirectX 12 (12_0), OpenGL 4.6, and Vulkan 1.3, meaning it can run ray-traced effects via software fallbacks in some titles, though performance will be poor. The GCN 4.0 architecture relies entirely on its 2304 shading units for all compute tasks, including any software-based ray tracing work.

The display output configuration is modern for its era: 1x HDMI 2.0b and 3x DisplayPort 1.4a, which supports high refresh rates at 1080p and 1440p, though the card's raw performance limits practical frame rates. The absence of RT and tensor cores means features like DLSS or FSR's AI-accelerated variants are unavailable; users must rely on spatial upscaling solutions that do not require dedicated hardware. The Vulkan 1.3 API support is noteworthy, as it ensures compatibility with modern Linux workloads and Vulkan-based game engines, but the lack of RT hardware is a definitive limitation for any ray-traced gaming.

Power and Cooling

The RX 480 carries a 150 W TDP with a single 6-pin power connector, and AMD recommends a 450 W power supply. This is a modest power envelope that makes the card suitable for most mid-range systems without requiring PSU upgrades. The dual-slot cooler design, measuring 240 mm in length, 95 mm in height, and 35 mm in width, is compact enough for most ATX cases, though the 1.4-inch width may cause clearance issues in smaller builds. The 14 nm process from GlobalFoundries, with 5,700 million transistors on a 232 mm² die, yields a transistor density of 24.6 million per square millimeter—efficient for its time but not exceptional by modern standards.

The single 6-pin connector limits overclocking headroom, as the card's power delivery is capped by that interface. The 150 W TDP is consistent with the card's performance class; it does not run excessively hot but requires adequate case airflow. The 450 W PSU recommendation is conservative and achievable with quality units, but users with older or lower-wattage power supplies should verify their system's total draw before installation. The card's end-of-life production status means no new units are available, and used examples will have varying thermal paste and fan conditions that affect real-world temperature and noise.

How It Compares

AMD Radeon HD 7950: The RX 480 scores 34,059 versus the HD 7950's 34,050, a delta of 0%. This is effectively a tie in average benchmark scores. The RX 480 brings modern API support (Vulkan 1.3 vs. the HD 7950's older feature set) and double the VRAM (8 GB vs. likely 3 GB), but raw performance is identical. Upgrading from an HD 7950 to an RX 480 yields no frame rate improvement—only feature compatibility.

NVIDIA TITAN V: The TITAN V scores 34,355, which is 0.9% higher than the RX 480. This is a negligible difference in average scores, despite the TITAN V being a far more expensive and power-hungry product. The data shows that in this specific benchmark suite, the RX 480 trades blows with a flagship NVIDIA card from a different era, which speaks to the benchmark's weighting rather than real-world gaming equivalence.

AMD Radeon RX 6700 XT: The RX 6700 XT scores 33,721, which is 1% lower than the RX 480. The RX 480 is technically faster in this average score, but the 1% delta is within noise. The RX 6700 XT has superior modern features, but the benchmark data does not reflect that advantage in this particular aggregate metric.

AMD Radeon RX 560 XT: The RX 560 XT scores 34,427, which is 1.1% higher than the RX 480. This is the closest rival in terms of score, and the RX 480 trails by a hair. The two cards are effectively interchangeable in average performance, though the RX 560 XT is a later product with potentially better driver optimization.

Benchmark Performance

The RX 480's benchmark scores reveal a card that is remarkably consistent across different test types. In 3DMark Steel Nomad (DX12), it scores 966 points—a low absolute number that reflects the test's demands, but the card's relative position is what matters. The Geekbench Metal score of 51,057 is the highest of the four benchmarks, indicating strong performance in Apple's Metal API, while the OpenCL score of 38,245 and Vulkan score of 45,968 show a spread that favors Vulkan over OpenCL by approximately 20%.

Comparing the RX 480 to its nearest rivals, the data shows a tight cluster. Against the HD 7950 (34,050, 0% delta), the RX 480 is statistically identical. Against the TITAN V (34,355, -0.9%), the RX 480 is marginally slower—less than 1% in aggregate. The RX 6700 XT (33,721, 1% delta) is actually slower than the RX 480 in this benchmark suite, and the RX 560 XT (34,427, -1.1%) is the only rival that beats the RX 480 by more than a fraction. These deltas are all within 1.1%, meaning the RX 480's average score of 34,059 places it in a four-way statistical tie with cards that span from 2012 to 2021.

The 78th percentile ranking is the more informative metric. It means the RX 480 outperforms 78% of all GPUs in the database, which suggests it remains a capable card for its intended resolution class. However, the average benchmark score of 34,059 is dragged down by the 3DMark Steel Nomad result of 966, which is a modern, demanding test. In older DirectX 11 and Vulkan titles, the RX 480's relative performance would be higher than this aggregate suggests, but the data only provides these four scores.

FAQ

Q: Does the RX 480 support hardware ray tracing?

A: No. The FACT PACK lists rtCores as null, meaning there are no dedicated ray tracing cores. Any ray-traced effects would rely on software compute via the 2304 shading units, which is not practical for gaming.

Q: What is the maximum memory bandwidth of the RX 480?

A: The card has 256.0 GB/s of bandwidth, derived from 8 GB of GDDR5 memory on a 256-bit bus with an effective clock of 8 Gbps.

Q: Can the RX 480 handle 4K gaming?

A: The data does not support 4K as a viable resolution. The 32 ROPs and 40.51 GPixel/s pixel rate are insufficient for 4K in modern titles, and the 78th percentile ranking reflects mid-tier performance, not high-end capability.

Q: What power supply is required for the RX 480?

A: AMD recommends a 450 W PSU. The card itself has a 150 W TDP and requires a single 6-pin power connector.

Q: How does the RX 480 compare to the RX 6700 XT in average benchmark scores?

A: The RX 480 scores 34,059, while the RX 6700 XT scores 33,721, a 1% delta in favor of the RX 480. This is a statistical tie, though the RX 6700 XT has modern features like ray tracing that the RX 480 lacks.

Q: What is the launch MSRP of the RX 480?

A: The launch MSRP is 229 USD, as listed in the FACT PACK.

Memory Subsystem

The RX 480 is equipped with 8 GB of GDDR5 memory on a 256-bit bus, providing 256.0 GB/s of bandwidth. This configuration was generous for its 2016 release, giving the card enough VRAM for high-texture settings at 1080p and 1440p. The 256-bit bus width is a middle-ground design—wider than entry-level 128-bit cards but narrower than high-end 384-bit or 512-bit solutions. The effective memory clock of 8 Gbps is standard for GDDR5 of that era, and the resulting 256.0 GB/s bandwidth is sufficient for the card's 5.834 TFLOPS compute throughput; the memory subsystem does not bottleneck the shading units in most workloads.

For high resolutions, the 8 GB capacity is the more important factor than bandwidth. At 1440p, many modern games exceed 4 GB of VRAM usage, and the RX 480's 8 GB buffer prevents texture thrashing in most titles. However, the 256.0 GB/s bandwidth becomes a limiting factor at higher resolutions and with anti-aliasing enabled, as the card's 40.51 GPixel/s pixel rate cannot fully utilize the available memory throughput. The 1:1 FP16 to FP32 ratio (both 5.834 TFLOPS) means there is no half-precision advantage for compute workloads that could offload memory pressure. The memory subsystem is adequate for the card's intended 1080p use case but is not a strength at 1440p or beyond, where the 32 ROPs and texture rate of 182.3 GTexel/s become the more significant constraints.